


Growing Seasons

by Violsva



Category: Marvel, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - 19th Century, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst, Background Colonialism, Bisexual Characters, Blizzards, Bucky Barnes Cooks, Clint Barton's Farm, Domestic Chores, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Fourth of July, Gender and Self-Presentation, Hard of Hearing Clint Barton, Having the Same Conversation Over and Over Again, Implied Suicidal Behaviour, Little PTSD Support Group on the Prairie, Lucky (Hawkeye) - Freeform, M/M, Mentions of Forced Prostitution, Multi, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, Outdoor Sex, Past Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers, Past Character Death, Period Typical Attitudes, Pining, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Post-American Civil War, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sharing a Bed, Sign Language, Tinnitus, Woman on Top, everyone has their own issues, farming, hunting animals for food
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:02:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26783368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Violsva/pseuds/Violsva
Summary: “I’m sorry for imposing on you like this,” the stranger said, pulling his scarf down to reveal dark stubble and a surprisingly pretty mouth. “But the storm came up sudden, and I got no idea where the nearest town is. Could you point me in the right direction?”“You won’t make it in this storm,” said Clint. “Stay until it blows over, it’s no trouble.”
Relationships: Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton, James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 42
Kudos: 147





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Don't ask me how long I've been working on this thing. Complete draft, updates Fridays.
> 
> Thanks to Pixies for beta/cheerreading, as usual, and also for the title, and to Knumpify for firearms consulting.

April blizzards were the worst, Clint reflected. And there always had to be one, and always at the worst possible time—like the day Nat had gone out to trade in town. Maybe they should have gone to California after the war instead. He bet in California you didn’t end up waiting inside for days for a blizzard to be over.

At least the house was warm, and they still had enough fuel for the fire, and it hadn’t come right after the year’s planting. And Nat had friends in town she could stay with overnight if she had to. He wished he’d been able to go instead, but she’d told him if he made his ankle any worse she’d make him sleep in the barn with Lucky until it was better. But he hated sitting around alone.

The storm made it dark enough inside despite the spring and the early hour that he’d had to light the lamp to keep mending, and the wind was almost screaming, blending with the usual ringing in his ears. But he heard something over it, and twitched, and then stared at the door. It wasn’t just his ears—someone was knocking. Clint shoved himself to his feet and made his way to the door, careful with his healing left ankle.

He hoped it was Nat returning early, but the strength of it told him otherwise before he’d even fully left his chair. And she wouldn’t have knocked anyway. So he wasn’t surprised by the strange man who faced him when he opened the door.

He was surprised by the man’s empty left coat sleeve, fluttering in the wind, but he just said, “Come inside before the storm does,” and the stranger entered so Clint could slam the door behind him. Dressed for the weather as he was, Clint couldn’t see anything of his looks except for his tired grey eyes.

“I’m sorry for imposing on you like this,” he said, pulling his scarf down to reveal dark stubble and a surprisingly pretty mouth. His voice was quiet and harsh, as if he hadn’t used it much, and no doubt he hadn’t, if he was travelling alone in the middle of winter. But the accent wasn’t what Clint had expected at all, not just eastern but definitely New York. “But the storm came up sudden, and I got no idea where the nearest town is. Could you point me in the right direction?”

“You won’t make it in this storm,” said Clint. “Stay until it blows over, it’s no trouble.”

The stranger nodded, looking a little surprised. “Thanks. There somewhere I can put my horse?” he asked.

“Go left out the door and there’s a line leading to the barn,” Clint said. “Find her a stall. I won’t begrudge you some hay. Oh, and don’t mind the dog, he’s friendly.” He kind of wished he’d brought Lucky into the house, but Nat would know if he tried.

The stranger nodded again and went out. Clint saved sweeping the snow from the door until he returned, and spent the time until then building up the fire. When the stranger returned he was carrying a pack that must have been on the horse, and he shook the snow off himself before stepping away from the door.

When he’d taken off hat and coat and scarf and a good pile of other coverings, he was revealed as a dark-haired man with a face that more than made up for the missing arm in looks and a body that clearly more than made up for it in strength. “James Barnes,” he said, holding out his hand.

“Clint Barton,” Clint said, shaking it. “Come sit down. You been travelling long?”

Barnes’ mouth tilted wryly. “A while.” He took the second chair by the fire, staring at the flames. His hair was shaggy, hanging almost over his eyes. He hadn’t seen a barber since well before he’d left New York, Clint would bet. Shame; they were nice eyes, or had been, before whatever had yanked all the emotion out of them.

“Where you going?”

“West.”

Damn. Clint had been hoping for some conversation to liven up the evening, but it didn’t look like he’d get it. He’d have to provide his own. He wasn’t putting up with the goddamned ringing in his ears if there was someone around to distract him from it.

“We’ve been here since the war, my partner and me,” he said, and Barnes tensed some at the mention of the war but didn’t shush him. So he nattered on about the farm and the area, and Barnes relaxed a little, though he didn’t speak much more.

The storm didn’t let up. When it was full dark Clint stood and said, “Best start supper.” Barnes went to his pack. “No, don’t worry, I’ll cook for us both,” Clint said, but Barnes just crossed the room back to him with a packet that turned out to hold cheese, sharp hard cheese the like of which Clint hadn’t seen in years. “Oh. Thanks.”

Barnes didn’t complain about Clint’s cooking, and after supper, when Clint was doing more damned sewing and Barnes was sitting occasionally flexing his hand like he wanted something to do with it, he asked, “Why’d you come to Iowa?”

“I grew up around here,” said Clint, which was true but not actually an answer. “Didn’t want the bother of a homestead with no idea what kind of land we’d get.” He slid sideways away from the topic, and couldn’t tell by Barnes’ still face if he’d noticed or not.

The evening stretched out, and Clint grabbed a walking stick and went out to the barn. Lucky whined at him when he got in, and he went to pet him. “I know, but there ain’t space for you in the house, boy, and it’s honestly probably warmer in here, too. Oh, good for you not savaging Barnes today, too.” Barnes’ horse was a nice grey, a little standoffish but not threatening when someone she wasn’t used to fed her.

Clint went through the chores and came back very glad he wasn’t stuck out in that storm, and hoping Nat had found someone with a spare bed. “Take the bunk in here,” he said, waving at it. “It’s made up new. I’m for bed myself.” He wasn’t too worried about Barnes walking off with anything—if he tried it he’d end up dead in a snowbank by morning.

Barnes nodded, and Clint banked the fire. “Be sure to blow out the lamp,” he said, lighting a candle from it, and then he went into the bedroom.

Barnes had nightmares. Clint had expected he might, but he’d thought he wouldn’t notice it, especially with the storm still blowing. When he woke in the night he wasn’t sure why, until he heard another scream and realized it wasn’t just the wind. Damn.

He thought he could make out words, though, which was a surprise; or rather, one word. A name.

“Steve!” Barnes shouted in his sleep, desperate and longing. “Steve!”

Clint winced. From his and Nat’s experience, it would be no good trying to wake Barnes; better he stay away and hope Barnes wouldn’t remember any of the dream in the morning. But it was hard to lie still while a man sounded like he was being tortured in the next room; and also if this lasted it didn’t look like Clint would be getting any more sleep himself.

But it didn’t last; eventually the shouts quieted. The bedroom was still utterly dark, though with the storm wind still wailing that didn’t say much about what the hour was. Clint relaxed, and hoped he wasn’t about to sleep through chore time.

He didn’t, though when he woke to a continuing blizzard he almost wished he had. He got up and threw on enough clothes that he wouldn’t freeze, and went out to the barn, feeling his way along the line. He wondered how Barnes had managed it one-handed and with his horse the day before.

Barnes had stirred when Clint passed through the main room; when he got back the man was awake and dressed, and he’d put the kettle on the fire and broken the ice on the water barrel.

“Good morning,” said Clint. “Eggs!” He put them on the table and got out the frying pan. “Didn’t expect them, given the storm.”

“Morning,” said Barnes, nodding genially. “Any sign of the weather lightening?”

“Afraid not.”

Barnes shook his head. “There coffee?”

They got breakfast together with a surprising amount of cooperation, and afterwards Clint settled back to the mending—he wasn’t great at it, but he was better than Nat, so he got stuck with it. And how Nat had managed to grow up without learning to sew Clint didn’t want to think about.

After lunch Clint got out a deck of cards and Barnes’ eyes lit up. “Ain’t playing for money,” Clint warned.

Barnes snorted. “We’d better not be, I ain’t got any,” he said, and they played stud poker until Clint glanced up and said, “I think I can see the sky out there.”

The storm was dying down, to just a few snowflakes. Barnes frowned out the window.

“It’s too late for you to get very far before dark, though,” Clint said. “Probably wouldn’t make town. You might as well stay here and leave in the morning.” Nightmares or not, talkative or not, Clint appreciated having someone else around. If Barnes wouldn’t make it to town Nat would probably have the sense not to leave for home either, which was disappointing. But better than dealing with whatever Barnes’d think of Nat.

“If it ain’t a trouble,” Barnes said cautiously.

“Course not. I got nothing to do but see to the animals until tomorrow anyway.” He put the deck in front of Barnes to cut.

Barnes nodded, cut the deck, and dealt another round.

Dark came early, even without the storm, and it was after that but still before time to think about dinner when the door opened.

“Nat!” Clint cheered at the small bundled up figure dragging in a sledge. He crossed the room and wrapped her in his arms as she started to unwind her scarf, and she laughed. “Did you leave while it was still storming?”

“Just as it stopped,” she said, hugging him back. “Let me get all this off.”

Clint stood back and let her. He’d nearly forgotten about their visitor, until he heard, disbelieving, “ _Nate_? Nate Rushman?”

Oh. This was awkward. Clint waited for Nat’s smooth smile and explanation, “Oh, you must have met my brother,” but it didn’t come. Instead she looked as amazed as Barnes sounded. “Sarge,” she said quietly.

Clint turned. Barnes took a hesitant step forward, looking as if he’d seen a ghost. Then Nat rushed past Clint and wrapped her arms around Barnes, and he cautiously hugged her back, his head dropping to her shoulder.

“No one could tell me if you were alive,” Nat said.

“I was sure you weren’t,” said Barnes. “Like—” He shook his head and pressed his face harder into Nat’s shoulder. Clint turned away and went to unpack Nat’s sledge.

Clint had met Nat during the war, but she’d had her work and he’d had his, and there had been long periods of time when he hadn’t seen her. Most of those she’d been spying on the Rebs, and he’d assumed from his accent that Barnes was Union, but he could be wrong. Or she could have met a Union company at any time.

Clint started on a somewhat early dinner—Nat had been travelling and could no doubt use it, and it kept him from snooping too much. Nat and Barnes were sitting now, talking some but mostly just staring at each other.

“Barnes and I met during the war,” Nat said when he had dinner ready.

“Thought you must have,” Clint said. Nat nodded at him and he continued, “Anything new happen in town?”

They talked about the news from town over dinner, Barnes saying even less than usual and still staring at Nat. And then there were the hours of the evening to get through, when Clint wanted to pull Nat aside and find out whatever she’d tell him about Barnes. He excused himself to the barn instead, though Nat had probably already seen to their horse, and checked over all the buildings while he was at it, looking to see if the storm had caused any damage and knocking the snow off the roof of the outhouse, which he’d have to replace sometime this spring.

He went back in, making a lot of noise about it, and sat and played cards with them both until bedtime. Barnes didn’t make it awkward when Clint and Natasha offered him the bunk in the main room again and went together into the bedroom.

They didn’t always sleep together, actually; that was why the second bed was still there, for nights when one or the other wanted to be alone, or had nightmares, or simply couldn’t sleep at all. But it wouldn’t be a hardship to share for one night. And, mostly, Clint was curious.

So he didn’t waste a second before asking Nat, “When did you meet him?”

“He’s still awake, you know,” she said.

Clint rolled his eyes and switched to the Indian hand talk he’d taught her during the war. _Was he Union?_

 _Yes. From New York. I spent six months with him. It was barely a year into the war, but he was already like that._ She waved a hand at the door to the other room. _He’d been there since the beginning. Fourteenth Brooklyn. I ran messages and water and supplies for them._ She paused, then added, _I’d just left Richmond, I was sure Jordan was coming after me, and I thought I’d be safer with the Army. And I was, don’t laugh._

This had been before Nat had signed up with Pinkerton at all, then. It wasn’t exactly hard to imagine her playing powder monkey for a Union troop, but it was hard to imagine her doing it for more than a week or two, or letting herself have feelings about them. But this had been right after she’d fled the Confederate spy ring she’d worked for in the beginning. She wouldn’t have been the Nat he knew during the war, not then.

_He was the sergeant?_

_Yes._ She frowned at their reflections in the window glass. _He lost someone, early on in the war, I think._

“Steve?” Clint said. She raised her eyebrows and nodded. _He dreamed about him, last night. He talks in his sleep._

“Still?” she sighed.

 _And you,_ Clint started, and didn’t know how to finish it. Saying _You loved him_ might be overstating it, and anyway would only get him scorn. But the way she’d flung herself at Barnes—

 _He was kind,_ she said. _And lonely himself, so I felt like I could do something useful._

_Did you sleep with him?_

“Do you care?”

“Hey,” said Clint, raising his hands. “I told you I wasn’t dumb enough to try to chain you. And I’m definitely not going to throw a fit over something that happened before you even met me.”

She smiled, and patted his cheek patronizingly. “You’re very sweet. Unbutton me?” She turned her back, and Clint unbuttoned her and considered whether he wanted to be a pain and annoy her until he got more of an answer. He was pretty sure it was _yes_ , so the question was whether he wanted details.

Maybe not, but he did want something else. As Nat stepped out of the dress he tapped her shoulder, and she turned to him as she started unbuttoning her petticoats. _Where’d he lose the arm?_ he asked.

“Antietam,” she said shortly. “I assume, anyway. I lost track of him then.” _No one could tell me if you were alive_ , Clint remembered her saying to Barnes. Well then.

And just after Antietam she’d shown up in Clint’s path and he’d talked Pinkerton into taking her on. He’d wondered who she was grieving for. He reached out, and she sighed and leaned against him.

“You tired?” he asked, and she shook her head. He kissed her, and she pressed herself against him, only wearing her shift. “Miss me?” he whispered, and she made a grab for him. “Hope you missed the rest of me too.”

“Don’t you have anything better to do with your mouth?” she asked, and he did. He noticed that she kept his mouth occupied the whole time, and she herself was quieter than usual, but that wasn’t really a surprise.


	2. Chapter 2

When Clint came in from the barn the next morning, Barnes was stirring up the fire and Nat was getting out the kettle. “Couple of hens are laying already,” Clint said. Nat held out a hand and he gave her the eggs and took the kettle, and he made coffee and she made breakfast, working around each other as they always did, though she made him sit down whenever he didn’t need to be stirring something. Neither of them were much good at cooking, but they’d managed to get into a routine over the last couple years.

Years. It was hard to remember. He occasionally still woke up expecting to have to go shoot people; more often he thought of the war as having been weeks ago, or maybe months, definitely not years. He flipped the first pancakes onto a plate, and then grabbed the coffee pot and mugs, and Nat finished the last round of pancakes as he poured.

“How’d you get real coffee out here, anyway?” Barnes asked between bites. Nat laughed.

“Clint insists,” she said.

“Had enough of that chicory shit during the war,” Clint said.

“Ain’t that the truth,” Barnes said, then gave Nat a startled look. She pretended not to see it.

“I got the general store in town to order it in special,” Clint said.

“Maybe I’ll stop there and buy some on my way past,” said Barnes. Nat looked up.

“Don’t need to be today, though,” she said casually. “You could stay a bit longer.”

Barnes stared at her for a moment too long, then glanced out the window and at Clint. “If it ain’t a bother...” he said, very uncertainly.

“It isn’t,” Nat insisted. Barnes glanced at Clint, and Clint smiled at him and went back to his pancakes.

“Okay,” Barnes said carefully.

“Could you get to the trapline in the storm?” Nat asked when they were finished eating. Clint shook his head and started to stand—it’d give Nat and Barnes more time to talk, anyway—“I’ll go do that then. You rest that ankle.” She took down her rifle and bullet pouch and started putting on layers. Clint blinked and stayed where he was.

“Be safe,” he said as she went out the door; she waved a hand and shut it.

He and Barnes sat at the table in silence for a few minutes, and then Barnes said thoughtfully, “Nat...”

“Yeah?”

“Is she a man or a woman?” Funny question, if he’d gone to bed with her, but there were all kinds of reasons he might ask anyway.

“Oh, woman, definitely,” said Clint. “I’ve seen her dressed up in the height of fashion a few times, that was something. I don’t think she’s dressed as a boy since the war.” She wore pants under her skirts sometimes, but that was just practical.

“Right,” said Barnes. He frowned. “So why ain’t you married her?”

That was a reproach, a clear stance in defence of Natasha’s reputation. Clint laughed. “I ain’t taking advantage of her,” he said. “Nat doesn’t do anything she don’t want to do.” But if Nat had been undercover, in a sense, when Barnes knew her, maybe he wouldn’t know that.

“And what do your neighbours think of her?” Barnes challenged. “Are you saying you ain’t even bothered to try convincing her?”

Not just Nat’s reputation, Clint thought, whether or not Barnes knew what he was really thinking. Jealousy, or, at best, concern that Clint was going to walk off and leave her. Not that Nat wouldn’t manage, if he did anything that stupid.

“The neighbours think we’re married,” Clint said. Barnes looked like he was going to object again, and Clint found himself adding, “I’ve got a wife already.”

Barnes stared at him, turning his head and looking openly, instead of the careful side glances he’d been giving Clint before. “Married her before the war, haven’t seen her since. No idea where she is. Nat knows about her.”

“Oh.”

“So if I could, and Nat wanted it, which is not a guarantee, I would’ve. Hell, if she wanted it badly enough we could’ve figured something out, and I would have called it binding whether the law did or not. But Nat don’t care, because she knows I don’t need it. I’m staying here, and she’ll stay with me as long as...” That was ... actually a little more honest than he’d intended. But now that he’d started there wasn’t anything to do but finish. “...as she wants to. Tying her down ain’t going to make that any longer.”

Barnes did look reassured, sort of. Then he looked puzzled. “And you’re telling _me_ this?” he asked, quietly enough that Clint only guessed at the words. It was what Clint himself was wondering. He usually tried not to even think about any of this.

But Nat trusted Barnes, and Nat had said, “Stay a bit longer,” and ... Clint liked him. Liked his concern for Nat too, misplaced as it was.

“Any friend of Nat’s,” he muttered. “Anyway, like I said, she does what she wants. I ought to get working on the bread. If you need anything, just tap me on the shoulder or something, in case I don’t hear you asking.” Because apparently he was just admitting everything today. He grabbed the bowl of starter before he started telling Barnes he was a thief raised by Indians, too.

Luckily the starter had actually doubled overnight despite the cold, so he didn’t look like an idiot.

_Steve_ , he remembered. He knew something about Barnes that Barnes probably wouldn’t have chosen to tell him. That might be why he was letting things slip. Seemed only fair.

And then while he was kneading Clint realized that Nat must have _told_ Barnes they weren’t married, or implied it pretty hard, because otherwise he would have just assumed they were like everyone else did. That was ... concerning.

As Clint got on with the kneading he noticed Barnes was getting antsy, and silently cursed Nat for ducking out on them. Seriously, she was the one who had asked Barnes to stay in the first place.

“You mind if I help out?” Barnes asked, luckily when Clint was looking at him. He reached for the broom. “Can’t abide having nothing to do when other people are working.”

“No, please, go ahead,” Clint said, squashing his mother’s horrified voice in his head. Barnes started sweeping, surprisingly unawkward despite his one arm. But then, he must have had a few years to get used to it.

Barnes asked something after a minute, and when Clint turned he was looking at the empty hooks by the door.

“Huh?” Clint asked. “What?”

“You’ve only got one rifle?” Oh. Ha.

“No, I’ve got one around somewhere. Don’t use it much, though.” He grinned as Barnes gave him a confused look. “You were looking right at my weapon, there.”

Barnes looked back. “Is that a bow?”

“Yep.”

Barnes shook his head. “Pretty sure even the Indians have given up bows by now, you know.”

The local ones still used them, or at least they had in the ’40s when Clint learned it from them, but he kept his mouth shut on that. “I’ve got the same range with it as a rifle, and it don’t take twenty seconds to reload. Believe me or not, as you like.”

“I’d like to see it beat my—I’d like to see it sometime.”

Even with the hesitation, if Clint’s hands hadn’t been covered in bread dough he’d have gone over and strung the bow right then. As it was he said, “Anytime. You the one that taught Nat to shoot?”

“Taught her to shoot a rifle, maybe. She showed up with a pistol. I thought she was just a kid.”

“She had the strangest damn upbringing, not that I’m one to judge,” Clint said. “You know she can’t sew?”

And to Clint’s surprise it turned out gossipping about Nat provided a lot of ground for conversation. Barnes still leaned away from details about himself, or the war, but Clint wasn’t carrying the whole conversation anymore, and he even got Barnes to talk about New York some. He finished kneading and put the bread in a bowl to rise and scraped his hands off while listening to Barnes talk about his forty or so relatives in Brooklyn.

“Too damn many people for one house,” Barnes said as Clint washed his hands in the still-damn-cold water.

“That why you came west?”

“More or less.” But this time, instead of clamming up entirely, Barnes added, “I did not need a bunch of women fussing and trying to take care of me.”

_And they let you come out here alone?_ Clint thought but didn’t say.

“You’ve come to the right place,” he said instead, cheerfully. “Mind helping with the dishes?”

It turned out Barnes could dry dishes just fine, with the counter to rest them on. After a while he asked, “Your family live round here?”

“No, they got left back east when my folks came out here when I was a kid. Never really met any of them. Where were you thinking of settling? Nebraska? Dakota?”

Barnes shrugged. “Dakota, I guess. Rode out of the last station on the line from Chicago, figured I’d find somewhere to settle down.”

“Good time for it. I mean, not this year, apparently, but most years you wouldn’t get snowed in like this. You’ll get there around planting season. Better than having to live by hunting for a year.” He wondered belatedly if Barnes could still shoot at all, but Barnes didn’t seem to take the comment the wrong way.

When Natasha came back the bread was in the oven and Clint was telling Barnes some of his better circus stories. He was kind of surprised when her arrival made him realize what he was talking about.

“Get much?” he asked Nat as she started to pull her hood down.

She waved a hand at the string of game she’d dropped to take her winter things off. “Not too bad,” she said. “It’s warming up. Most of the snow should be melted by tomorrow. I brought the traps back too, it’s too late in the year to keep them out.”

So the next day, his ankle mostly better, Clint went out to see how the winter wheat was doing and whether he’d have to start ploughing soon, and Barnes came with him. Lucky ran alongside them happily, and when he slid between them Barnes looked startled and then ran his hand over Lucky’s head. Clint grinned. He was feeling extremely well-disposed toward Barnes, for the very good reason that Barnes had made the three of them breakfast, better than anything Clint or Nat could cook.

The snow had melted, but the ground was still hard in the garden. The garden fence needed repairs, though—better do that before planting anything. They passed it and went into the wheat field. Most of it looked all right, but some of the seedlings were disturbed, and some were just plain uprooted. Clint swore quietly.

Something flashed in the corner of his vision. Clint put out an arm to stop Barnes moving, then dropped his cane and reached for his bow as his mind caught up with his eyes. He drew and loosed and the crow came down neatly.

“Nice,” Barnes said, with the impressed note that meant he hadn’t really believed you could do anything useful with a bow. Clint swaggered over to pick up the bird.

“They eat the seedlings,” he said, nodding at the field. “And, hey, they’ll make a good dinner, if we get enough of them.” Well, if _he_ got enough of them, really—no, wait, Barnes was holding a revolver.

“You hunt with that?” Clint asked, raising his eyebrows.

“I do,” Barnes said, spinning it around his finger.

Clint shook his head. “And you were surprised by my bow.”

Barnes shrugged, lifted his arm, and shot over Clint’s head. Birds flew up around the field at the noise, and a blackbird fell out of a tree as Clint turned.

Clint walked over, expecting it to be too destroyed by the shot to be worth taking back. But Barnes had shot it right through the head. “ _Damn_ ,” he said. When he looked back Barnes was looking ... probably about as smug as Clint had earlier.

Clint nodded at him with respect, and Barnes nodded back.

Clint made a circuit of his land, making mental notes about what needed attention and occasionally stopping to fix something that wouldn’t take long on the way. Barnes followed him, holding what Clint told him to hold, pointing out the occasional problem, and once in a while shooting birds if Clint didn’t see them first. The fact that he saw any birds before Clint was pretty impressive on its own.

Halfway through Barnes knelt, wedged his pistol between his knees, and reloaded it, smooth as anything. _Damn_ , Clint thought, but managed by some miracle not to say.

“So you planted it this fall and it survived through the winter?” Barnes asked when they got back to the wheat field. Clint blinked at him.

“Yeah, of course. Winter wheat. You know—Wait, where’re you from again?”

“Brooklyn,” Barnes said.

“You ever been on a farm before?”

“Only when we were marching through them,” Barnes said calmly.

“Huh.” Clint’s estimation of Barnes’ abilities went up, because he hadn’t realized that until the last question. “Well, you know how to cook these?” he asked, lifting the bag of birds.

“I’d guess the same as pigeons.”

“Go right ahead then,” Clint said, grinning and turning toward the house.

“I see your game,” Barnes muttered, but when Clint glanced at him he was smiling, a little.

*

Natasha didn’t suggest any time Barnes should leave. Clint was perfectly happy to have another hand for fence repairs, and he liked Barnes—would have liked him even if it weren’t for his cooking, though that was a bonus. Barnes looked apprehensive every day at breakfast, but he never suggested leaving himself, even as the days grew longer. When Clint said, “Ought to start planting potatoes today, I think,” one morning, Barnes just said, “Yeah?” and didn’t say anything about how if _he_ wanted to plant anything this year he ought to be leaving to stake a claim right about now.

“Work never stops in the summer,” Nat said.

“Too damn much for two people sometimes,” said Clint, taking the opportunity to complain like he always did, and then he realized Nat was giving Barnes a pointed look.

“I’ve thought we could hire someone on,” she said. “Given how well we did off the traplines this winter.” Shit, was that her game?

Well, if she wanted Barnes’ company, better he was here than in Dakota Territory. But Clint knew this could be the approach to the end, the time when she’d leave, or maybe ask Clint to leave.

Clint glanced at Barnes, and then looked away, because no man wanted anyone else to see that much hope in his eyes, even if the rest of his face was mostly still. Well, at least this time Clint had a chance to brace himself.

“Couldn’t pay too much,” Clint said. “Five dollars a week? But it’d be pretty steady work. I could clear another couple acres, with help.”

“You offering me a job?”

“Make breakfast like this every morning and I’d be a fool not to,” Clint said.

Barnes’ mouth moved for a second, then he cleared his throat and said, “Yeah, I could try staying here for a bit.”

“Good,” Nat said, so fast she almost cut him off. She smiled and poured them all more coffee.


	3. Chapter 3

He might be able to mend fences and shoot, but even if he’d had two arms Barnes would still be a city boy. Nat sat them down and made Barnes say what he was good at, and most of it was in the house. She split up the chores and went out to the fields with Clint most days herself. Which was, in fact, an enormous help.

Clint would have asked if Barnes minded, but he came home one evening to hear Barnes whistling as he cooked, and it was pretty clear he didn’t. Anyway, Clint did most of the stitching, it wasn’t like they were foisting all of the women’s work onto Barnes.

Nat did a lot of the gardening, but on a Monday when she was doing the laundry Barnes weeded it while Clint hauled endless buckets of water. “Wouldn’t it be easier to have a well closer to the house?” Barnes asked.

“Yeah,” Clint agreed. “The man we bought this place from had no idea what he was doing. That’s why he’s back east. Haven’t got around to digging a new one yet.”

Barnes frowned. “So you didn’t grow up here,” he said slowly.

“Not on this farm, no,” Clint admitted. “Southeast of here.”

Barnes let the silence grow expectant, and before it would be noticeably strange Clint added, “My brother got that place.” Which was true enough, for the couple of years before the bank had taken it back and Barney’d fucked off to hunt for gold in California.

Barnes nodded and didn’t ask further. That was the good thing about his silences: he might not talk about his own past, but he usually didn’t expect you to either.

Clint wondered, though, what conclusions Barnes was drawing in his own head. He liked Barnes well enough, but he wasn’t sure how he felt about another man watching his life, seeing all of it and having opinions about it.

But he did like having Barnes here. Clint had had good reasons for moving out west, far from the nearest town, and Natasha had even better ones, but living alone and not seeing anyone made people go odd, Clint knew that damn well. Or maybe just made people be themselves more.

If Clint showed any signs of turning out like his father he knew Natasha would either smack some sense into him or just up and leave, but having someone else around still made him feel better about it. Like that made it less likely, or like she’d have...

He didn’t know what. And that wasn’t most of it. Barnes, even with his silences, gave them more opportunities for conversation without having to go visiting or hope someone dropped by. Clint had whittled him a stand for his cards, and most nights the three of them played. Clint and Nat were both under less strain with another person to share the labour, and then of course there was his cooking. Hiring him had been a first-rate idea.

The only problem was, there was a reason why they had two beds.

Clint’s nightmares were mostly straightforward. If they didn’t wake him up, he didn’t remember them; if they did they were usually bad enough that he had to get up, go out to the other room and pace until he’d calmed down and could sleep again. Drink, sometimes, but usually not.

The first time he did that after Barnes arrived, he’d forgotten about Barnes entirely until he saw a hint of movement in the darkness and froze, halfway back to the dream again, before remembering. “Don’t mind me, go back to sleep,” he said, and he slumped onto the settle. It was right next to Barnes’ bed, but he’d still disturb him less there than if he were pacing around the room. He stared into the dark room, focusing on the familiar shadows of the furniture and the annoyance of being awake this long before dawn, when there wasn’t a hint of light in the room. His ears hummed in the silence. He felt tired enough to sleep sitting bolt upright on the hard wood, but he knew that’d change if he lay down.

He didn’t know how much longer it was before Barnes said, “Couldn’t sleep?”

“Oh, I slept,” Clint said bitterly. Barnes made a quiet noise—Clint couldn’t tell, without seeing his face, if it was sympathy or a question or what.

“Can’t believe it’s been nearly five years, most days,” Clint said, and Barnes laughed harshly.

“More than five years for me,” he said, and if he’d lost the arm at Antietam it must have been. “And it feels like I’m still there.”

Clint wondered if he meant to cast aspersions, but then Barnes said something else, and Clint said “Eh?” It was harder to make out words in the dark, without being able to watch mouths and expressions.

“ _Felt_ like,” Barnes repeated, not much louder but Clint was expecting it now and could make it out. “Feel it less, now.”

Barnes woke up whenever anyone entered the main room, but he didn’t seem to mind Clint’s occasional company. Sometimes he’d even talk, and Clint got to know his voice well enough that he could understand almost all of it even in the dark. Sometimes one or the other of them would draw a few of their war memories out, like pus from a wound, and let them fall into the dark air between them.

So that worked out well enough, and sometimes Clint—and, he hoped, Barnes—even managed to go back to sleep eventually.

But on Natasha’s bad nights she couldn’t sleep at all with someone else in the bed—or at least, with a man in the bed. Sometimes if Clint stayed out of the room until she was asleep, he could manage not to wake her when he did get to bed, and sometimes she slept late into the mornings, but it wasn’t enough, especially not with the days growing longer and brighter. She was working as hard as Clint was, even if they had Barnes doing half the housework now. Eventually she had a run of bad nights, for over a week, and finally one evening she shook her head and put down her rifle with a clank.

“Barnes,” she said, “mind taking the bedroom tonight?”

Clint’s eyes widened, and he glanced over. Her hands had slipped, and she’d spilt the gunpowder. It had gotten worse than he’d thought, then.

Barnes was baffled, though. “You mean—” he asked, looking between her and Clint.

“I mean, you’d sleep with Clint, and I’d sleep out here,” she said sharply. Barnes did not look much less baffled.

“Nat has her own bad nights,” Clint said. “ _Can_ you sleep with someone else in the room?” Barnes nodded slowly. “Then that’s what we’ll do.” For all his casualness, he wasn’t expecting to sleep very well himself that night, but he’d manage. “Do you want us to clear out right now, Nat?”

“I’ll just go change,” she said, and went into the bedroom.

Barnes glanced at the door and then started gathering up the few—very few, though it was nearly summer by then—possessions he kept by the bed. Clint finished loading Nat’s rifle and hung it by the front door. When she came out in her nightdress he went over to her, not caring what Barnes thought, and paused a foot away from her until she reached for his shoulder and he could wrap his arms around her.

“Sleep well,” he said, and she rolled her eyes and kissed his cheek.

He banked the fire, and when he got up Barnes had disappeared into the bedroom and Nat had put out the lamps. “Good night.”

“Good night.”

In the bedroom Barnes was leaning against the wall, looking uncertain. He was next to Nat’s side of the bed, though, so Clint just crossed over to his own side. “You sleep there, I’ll sleep here, we’ll be fine,” he said, and Barnes nodded. Clint turned his back and stripped.

They lay down back to back, and Clint put out the candle, closed his eyes, and listened to Barnes’ breathing, fully expecting to be woken up later that night and thinking vaguely about how he might manage that.

Instead he woke warm and comfortable, with faint light already filtering into the room. He dressed and went out as Barnes started stirring. It wasn’t until he was coming back from the barn that he realized he’d slept the night through, without hearing anything from Barnes. And inside, Barnes was frying eggs and smiling at Nat and looking as well as he ever did in the mornings, and damned fine even if he hadn’t trimmed his beard lately.

It wasn’t like Barnes had nightmares every night, Clint told himself, sitting down. This had just happened to be one of the good nights, that was all. And Nat looked much better than she had recently too, which was the point.

That evening, when Clint was slumped as far back as his chair would allow and wishing he hadn’t decided to plow another acre this year, Nat asked, “Shall we have the same sleeping arrangement tonight?”

“Fine by me,” Clint said, thought he suspected he’d just fall asleep in his chair if he wasn’t careful.

“Yeah, sure,” said Barnes. If he had any nightmares that night, there was no chance Clint would have been able to tell. And somehow, that became their usual pattern, Clint and Barnes in the bedroom and Nat on the bunk.

It wasn’t perfect every night. Barnes did still have nightmares, and for that matter so did Clint. Sharing a bed with Barnes, who took up a lot more space than Natasha, meant that instead of war Clint mostly dreamt of the sod house he’d grown up in, sometimes violence and shouting and sometimes childhood horrors of bugs and worms crawling out of the walls.

Those, at least, he could fix by reaching out and placing his hand against the real, solid boards of the bedroom walls, without even needing to get up. Then he lay still and remembered where he was, and when, and that it was Barnes beside him and not his brother, and that the only other person in the house was Natasha.

One night while he was doing that, Barnes choked out, “Steve,” and whimpered something else. Clint was already awake this time, rather than being startled, so when Barnes woke up, gasping, Clint waited until his breathing slowed down and then reached out and put a gentle hand on his shoulder. Barnes slumped, then lay back down, sighing.

“Who was Steve?” Clint asked into the darkness. There was silence beside him, and then another sigh.

“Steve was a goddamn fool,” Barnes said. “A damn fool, and maybe the best man I’ve ever met.”

Once he’d started talking the words came out of him in a flood, fast enough that even sitting right next to him Clint was only guessing at some of them. “We came over in the same ship from Ireland as kids, and I got no damn idea how he survived it. Tiny kid, even full grown he didn’t weigh a hundred pounds soaking wet, and caught every flu going around. He used to have these fits where he couldn’t breathe—” Barnes’ own breath stopped for a moment, before he continued, “Championed every cause that came to his attention. I dragged him out of more alleyways—He’d start fights. Because someone said something he didn’t like, someone was hitting their wife, their dog, didn’t matter if they were twice his size. He didn’t like bullies, was how he put it.

“So of course he hated slavery. And of course when the war started he was first in line to join up, no matter that no one with a brain in their head would take him. And eventually—I kept telling him to stop trying, kept saying he’d—but of course he didn’t listen, and eventually he found some damn fool of a recruiting agent stupid enough to sign him on. And of course I had to go with him.”

“He died,” Clint said, figuring it’d be easier if Barnes didn’t have to say it.

“He nearly died just marching to Washington,” Barnes said. “But he didn’t. Lasted all of an hour into the battle at Bull Run—the first one, we hadn’t seen anyth—Goddamn idiot, no one would have said anything if he’d stayed home. Not a damn thing.”

His voice was breaking slightly, and Clint didn’t say anything, just let out a breath and leaned his shoulder slightly against Barnes’. Barnes leaned back. Clint felt him shaking a little with his breathing, and stayed where he was until it smoothed out and Clint began falling asleep as well.

*

Clint might have been more irked by it in winter, when he was less tired, but it was nearly a month of that arrangement before he wondered more than idly if he’d be sleeping with Natasha again anytime soon. There was no way of keeping Barnes out of the bedroom without making it very clear what they’d be doing, and while generally Clint had about as much shame as a New Orleans streetwalker he felt an unusual delicacy about this situation. So he didn’t bring it up, and jerked off when he had the privacy. He’d kind of expected a dry spell once Barnes moved in, though he hadn’t expected it to happen like this.

Even with the hard work, though, eventually Clint’s body reminded him that it’d been weeks since he’d last gotten some. He woke up one morning stiff and ready for it. There was a warm body pressed against his back, and he leaned into it, thinking about waking Natasha up for some play before chores. But it was someone larger than Natasha, solid and—and there was the beginning of a hard-on pressing against his lower back. He remembered who he was with at once and lay still, almost frozen, with Barnes leaning against him, breathing on the back of his neck.

He was pretty sure Barnes was still asleep. And he could just slide out of bed, get up and do the chores and not say anything. Or...

Those dark nights, with their shared horrors populating the darkness and then somehow fading into it, neither of them able to see the other but still utterly trusting. A couple times, Barnes had put his hand out and Clint had found it with his own, or Clint had rested a hand on the bed and felt Barnes’ over it. And then in bed together ... this wasn’t the first time they’d woken up nearly in each other’s arms.

Barnes hadn’t spoken of it directly, but Clint was pretty sure his Steve had been _his_. Clint was not the best man anyone had ever met, but at the least he wouldn’t be condemned for reaching out, however else Barnes responded.

He’d told Natasha he wouldn’t try to chain her, and she’d said that if he wanted his own freedom all he had to do was ask. But…

Clint lay there another minute, looking at the morning light through the shutters, and then slid out of bed and pulled his pants on.


	4. Chapter 4

Nat watched him that day in the fields. Clint pretended he hadn’t noticed it and kept cutting the hay, Nat following him and tying it into sheaves. Every hour or so as usual Barnes showed up with a bucket of water. At noon he brought lunch for the three of them, Lucky following him hopefully, and they ate together, sitting on a quilt over the sharp cut grass. Clint could get used to living like this.

Not too many hours into the afternoon, Nat waved a hand to get his attention and asked, _How’s the weather?_ Clint squinted at the western sky.

“Good,” he said cheerfully. “Should keep on like this for maybe even another week, more time than we need.”

“Good,” Natasha said, and he realized that while he’d been staring at the sky she’d come up behind him. He turned as her arms came around his neck, and she kissed him. Not lightly, either.

Clint kissed her back until she was sucking on his tongue and he was trying not to thrust his hips against her waist. It was hard, though, when she was pressing herself against him shamelessly, and his hands had somehow gone to cup her ass. He couldn’t feel any drawers or anything under her layers of skirts. “Nat,” Clint gasped, but she just kissed him again, and if she thought this was a good time he wasn’t going to put up more of a protest than that. When she pressed her hips against him again he squeezed her and pulled her as close as he could. His growing hard-on rubbed against her stomach. Clint sighed against her hair as she kissed his neck, her teeth coming out a little but not enough to leave a mark.

They stayed thrusting lightly against each other for some time, but Natasha was on her toes and Clint’s knees weren’t going to keep holding them up for much longer. “C’mon,” Clint said, pulling at her, and they managed to get onto the ground without landing too hard. Nat pushed him backwards until Clint was lying under her, and kissed him fiercely before pulling herself back up to sit astride him.

“Tasha,” Clint gasped, and she moved back and opened his trousers. “ _God_.”

She knelt up and lifted her skirts, and maybe she was planning on just sitting on his prick then and there, but though the idea was tempting Clint had some standards for himself. He slid a hand up her hard, muscled thigh and groaned as he found her hot and wet.

“Darling,” he murmured, as he slicked his fingers with her and played with her button. Natasha sighed and leaned forward, one hand landing on his shoulder for balance. He slid a finger into her and his eyes fell shut at the feeling. It had been way too long.

Natasha shifted position and pulled his hand gently away from her, just enough so that she could—“Oh Christ,” Clint said, and held his dick steady with his slick hand as she lowered herself onto him. “Oh Natasha.”

She planted her knees on either side of his hips and rode him, and he lay for a moment just gasping at the sky and trying to get control over his pleasure. When he thought he had it he bent his knees so he could thrust back against her, and looked at her properly.

She smiled down at him, panting for breath, her hair only a little disarrayed but her chest heaving. Clint wished she was naked so he could see her breasts bounce in the sunlight. The ground was hard and sharp bits of grass poked against his bare neck, but Natasha’s hair was shining copper and the clean smell of fresh-cut hay surrounded them. Clint realized that his hand was still under her skirt and slid it in between them. Nat moaned and her hands landed on his shoulders, balancing herself and holding Clint down. He kept stroking her and thrusting up into her and fought a losing battle to keep his eyes open.

She fell forward onto his chest as she clenched tight around him, and Clint reached for her hip with his free hand and kept going, letting her hot tight grip pull him over too.

Clint lay there, Natasha sprawled over him, until they’d both caught their breaths. They ruined Nat’s handkerchief cleaning up, and then got back to work, sneaking smiling glances at each other occasionally. Clint thought they managed to behave decently when Barnes brought them another bucket of water, but he wouldn’t swear to it.

*

Clint was used to going to the Independence Day celebrations alone. He liked them, liked the pride, liked being around people even if he couldn’t put up with them constantly for longer than a couple days. He liked seeing the kids, and he liked being able to put on a show again, just for the one day. Natasha didn’t; whenever she was in town she was constantly acting, playing the part of a respectable woman, and that was always going to come between her and any enjoyment she might get out of it. She had come one year, so that it didn’t look too odd; usually now if anyone happened to ask after her he made her excuses and that was the end of it.

This year, he knew, the neighbours would be expecting to see Barnes with him. The news that he and Nat had a hired man had spread; they hadn’t tried to keep it a secret, and the couple of visitors they’d had had been surprised enough by a one-armed hired man that he knew they’d have shared it with the world. He and Nat attracted gossip as it was, and in this area anyone new sparked interest, let alone a man with an obvious war wound.

Clint wasn’t going to force Barnes to go, though—the man was avoiding visitors as much as he could without the avoidance itself being conspicuous—and he was glad of that decision when, at the merest suggestion he might like to see the Fourth of July celebrations in town, Barnes snapped, “No,” and was silent for the rest of the evening.

“You think he’s got a problem with fireworks?” Clint asked Nat in the fields the next day.

“I expect so,” she said, and that was the end of it. Clint went off to town by himself the morning of the Fourth, without mentioning why so Barnes wouldn’t have any reason to feel ashamed of himself.

His horse could hear the firecrackers well before he was in sight of the town, and she wasn’t too happy about that. He found a group of others picketed well away from the blacksmith’s where most of the noise was coming from, and left her there and walked the rest of the way. 

A few people called out to him as he got up to the main street, and he waved and sometimes stopped for a word or two and let himself relax into who they thought he was. He caught up on all the local gossip, or at least all of it that wasn’t about him. He heard all about the horses people were expecting to see running that afternoon, and a little about the other spectacles, and he grinned and waved his bow when they asked if he’d be adding to them. The sheer difference between this and the pre-show preparations of the circus always gave him a kick. There was nothing riding on his performing, today, just maybe a few disappointed children. There was no hurry to set up, and there’d be no hurry to move on to the next town either. He was free, and neither a showman nor a soldier, and if his neighbours thought he was a little odd they had no right to thrash him for it, and most of them wouldn’t if they could.

He set himself up against a wall, where he’d be able to see anyone likely to run into his line of fire, and shot at a variety of targets for the kids and a few adults, letting a few of the older kids try to draw his bow, and cheerfully lying when they asked how he’d learnt it or what use it was. He knew it was lunchtime when most of them drifted off, and he collected his arrows and unstrung his bow and went to find some of the fried chicken he was smelling.

After lunch and more talk the shopkeeper and town blowhard prepared to make a speech, so Clint drank a dipperfull of lemonade and wandered over to make himself useful where they were finishing setting up the racetrack. Enough of the men working wanted to go hear the speech and singing that he was welcome replacing them.

It wasn’t that he objected to what the speeches were about, or what he assumed they were about. That was what he’d fought for, more or less. For independence from tyranny, from slavery, from ... the past, maybe. From any son of a bitch who thought he could own people, whoever they were and however he’d got a hold of them. But trying to listen to a speech about it, with his ears ringing and catching one word in three, from a man who hadn’t fought for it himself—Clint preferred to be hammering stakes.

“You got a new hand working for you, don’t you, Barton?” Wright asked as they finished the starting lines. Not too far away men were bringing up their horses, and Clint had to watch Wright’s mouth closely to be sure of his words. Not what he’d prefer to look at, given the choice.

“Yep,” Clint said. “Barnes. From New York.”

“Just the one hand, I hear.” Wright grinned.

“War injury. It don’t affect his work too bad.”

“He here today?” Clint let the obvious lack of Barnes anywhere nearby speak for him. “Or is he back home, with your wife?”

Why the hell was Clint bothering with this conversation? “You got something to say about my wife, Wright?”

He held Wright’s gaze until Wright dropped it. “No.”

“Good.” Clint turned around. “Mitchell, that your horse?”

Clint didn’t gamble—he knew too much about the bookmaker’s end of things—but he watched the racing and listened to everyone talk and found himself kind of wishing he was back shooting for the kids again. Normally he enjoyed this kind of thing, given how little male company he had most days. Now it grated.

Eventually he wandered back to the centre of town and gave a couple of little girls tips on beating the neighbour boys at marbles.

It was well before dark when Clint thought about getting home, but somehow today he didn’t feel like hanging around in the saloon until the fireworks started, and if he wasn’t staying for that it was a long ride and he might as well get going. He bought a newspaper for Nat, said a couple goodbyes, and went to find his horse.

It was strange. But then, it wasn’t just the two of them at home anymore. There was Barnes. And they’d had more visitors than usual for the past month, generally wanting a look at Barnes, and maybe that had put Clint off his neighbours a little. It was fine; he was just having an unsociable phase. He’d have a spell the other way eventually.

When Clint got back, though, Barnes wasn’t in the cabin. “He told me he’d be in the barn,” Nat said.

“If he was, he ducked out when he heard me,” Clint said, and worried over the thought while they prepared supper. Barnes might disappear for visitors, but Clint hadn’t thought he avoided Clint and Nat that way.

It was a damn odd thing, on a holiday. Clint could understand not liking people, could understand wanting to stay away from crowds, but going off completely alone, on the Fourth of July? They got few enough breaks from work as it was, and surely Barnes got more than enough time alone when Clint and Nat were in the fields. Natasha had been here, and Clint had kind of thought…

This wasn’t just about wanting to avoid crowds, or fireworks. What was Barnes doing? Was Clint going to have to go looking for him?

What would he find if he did? Natasha seemed concerned too, though if she’d been that worried when Barnes had left she would have followed him. Lucky hadn’t been around when Clint came back, but the dog wandered around a lot. But…

Barnes did come in for supper, though, so ravenous that Clint assumed he’d missed lunch. He didn’t talk much, and Clint didn’t try to make him, mostly just relieved that he was back in one piece. It wasn’t too odd for Barnes to be silent, though come to think of it it was a lot less common now than it used to be. But supper wasn’t too strange until suddenly both Barnes and Nat jumped and glanced around.

They relaxed almost immediately, but within a minute they jumped again, and Clint realized the fireworks must have started. They were far enough from the town that he couldn’t hear them, or maybe the bangs blended into the damned ringing that was always in the back of his head now, since the machine guns.

The other two were on edge for the rest of the meal, with occasional flinches. “It like this every year?” Clint asked Natasha. Normally he stayed in town until most of the fireworks were over. Even up close, they didn’t bother him as long as he could see them and knew they were coming.

She nodded. “Damn,” Clint said, wishing he’d asked earlier. He didn’t like the thought of Natasha alone for this all evening, every year, and it hadn’t occurred to him she was until now. He’d thought they were out of earshot of the town. Should’ve known better than to trust his own judgement of that.

Clint did the washing up after dinner and then did some of the mending he’d been putting off, one of Nat’s working dresses and some of her stockings. Barnes was very quiet, but neither Clint or Natasha was going to pester him with questions tonight. When Barnes and Nat had stopped flinching regularly—so Clint assumed the fireworks had mostly stopped—Barnes went to bed. Natasha put down the newspaper Clint had brought her and got out her fancy smelling soaps and started washing her face and braiding her hair.

When Clint had asked her why she was spying for the Union, when she could easily have done anything else, she’d said, “I’m balancing my books.” He understood it, more or less, knew she’d done shit she wasn’t proud of in the early days of the war, before she’d defected, but she’d gone well past any debt she might have had long before Appomattox.

Clint hovered, finishing nearly all of the mending and then finding Nat’s bullet mold and wondering whether she was likely to need more ammunition any time soon. “Clint,” Natasha said finally, “go to bed. I’m all right.”

“I just—I could have stayed home,” Clint said, not meaning just today but for the past few years. Nothing to do with war was fair, he knew that, but it seemed especially wrong that Nat could go fight for a country that had never even asked it of her, after going through more in her youth than most soldiers did in battle, and then after it was all over be knocked about by the victory celebrations. The least he could have done was stay with her through it.

“They talk about us enough as it is,” Natasha said. “If I needed you to I’d have asked. Go to bed.”

Clint kissed her and went to bed. 

As far as Clint knew, Barnes didn’t sleep at all that night. He wasn’t even trying when Clint fell asleep, just sitting straight up against the wall. But he’d responded when Clint said goodnight, his eyes moved instead of staring blankly, and the expression on his face was sad thoughtfulness rather than the kind of blankness or horror that Clint associated with really bad nights, so Clint left him to it and hoped he was making the right choice.

The next morning, though, while Barnes looked pretty worn, he smiled when Clint came in from the barn, and he’d made a fancy omelette for breakfast. Clint made his appreciation of it obvious—it wasn’t hard—and Barnes just grinned at him and Natasha, still sad, maybe, but somehow reconciled to it.


	5. Chapter 5

Bucky had forgotten the Fourth was coming up.

That had never happened before. Every year, even—especially—during the war, in the sweltering South, even the first year back in New York when he hadn’t paid much attention to anything outside his bedroom, he’d always known when it was coming. He’d spent early summer every year tense with the knowledge, and the fireworks—“Sure, they’re for your birthday, mavourneen, must be,” Mrs. Rogers had always smiled at Steve—the fireworks had never been a surprise.

Still a torment. Still a harsh reminder of both the war and Steve’s absence. But not a surprise.

But this year he hadn’t thought of it once until Barton mentioned it. He could tell himself it was the unfamiliarity, the hard work, the lack of Brooklyn calling Steve’s name at him everywhere he went. The fact that, unlike his family, Barton and Nat hadn’t known Steve, and wouldn’t mention him. But that hadn’t changed anything during the war.

Once he was reminded what time of year it was, it hurt the same way it always had. But it wasn’t the only thing he could think of anymore. After that night when Barton had first mentioned it, at the end of June, he’d expected to have to hide his misery for the next full week. But after that night, he hadn’t been miserable, or not any more than he had been before it.

On the Fourth itself he planned on going off alone—he should be helping Nat around the house, but he couldn’t really stand the thought of it. Once he passed the barn, though, Lucky came running up next to him, and Bucky blinked and didn’t shoo him off. He went down to the woods in the corner of Barton’s property and sat by the creek there, and tried to figure out what was going on in his head.

He still missed Steve like a hole in his chest, like he missed his left arm, and with the same occasional certainty that it was still there, until he looked for it. But it wasn’t any worse this month than it had been before, and—and he could go days without it stabbing at him. Like he could go days now almost believing it was normal to only have one arm.

In Brooklyn, even back with his family, there’d been nothing in his life except Steve’s absence, and knowing that he was a burden on his relatives. Now…

He had work to do. He didn’t fool himself that he was needed. Nat and Barton had clearly got along fine without him for years. But he was liked, and if he wasn’t doing anything they couldn’t do at least he was saving them from having to do it. He didn’t feel like he was wronging them by taking the five dollars a week, even if being here, with them…

With Nat, no longer a child full of bravado barely covering over her fear, but a woman holding lightly both all the potential of the boy she’d seemed and all the pain he’d thought might be behind the seeming. With Barton, who had a past Bucky suspected might be darker than his own, and came home in the evenings smelling like hay and sunshine, hair lightened by the sun and face beginning to crease with age. Two people who’d seen as much as he had or worse, and had found rest and work here to exorcise that. And they, or that work, or something in the air of this farm, or all of those, were slowly bleeding into him as well, giving him something other than the memory of Steve to fill his skin with.

Lucky, who had been running around, came and slumped next to Bucky, panting, and Bucky petted him absently. He leaned over to look at his reflection in the creek, wondering if he’d recognize himself. But it was still him—though his beard was starting to annoy him, and he should really ask Nat to do something about his hair. The same eyes, though, the same face. But this was the face of a man who—

He didn’t know. He hadn’t forgotten Steve, and he didn’t want to. But—maybe what it was was that he wasn’t owned by Steve’s ghost anymore. And hell, Steve had always hated the idea of owning people. So maybe that was all right.

* * *

Summer went on, and Clint kept falling exhausted into bed at night. At least he knew Nat was sleeping too, though he’d have preferred if he could see that she was. But that was the point, that she needed her own bed sometimes.

Other than that, he didn’t mind sharing with Barnes; Barnes’ nightmares weren’t much more frequent than Clint’s, now, or at least they were quiet enough that Clint didn’t wake up for them. But he thought they were less frequent too.

And Clint’s nightmares now were usually easier to shake off than they had been too. Just knowing there was someone else there helped, although he felt guilty sometimes about waking Barnes.

But they still happened. Clint woke up from a bad one about the war at some dark hour one night, panting for breath. He lay there flat on his back, until he realized what he was waiting for and looked over at Barnes.

Barnes was still asleep.

Always before now, if the nightmares were bad enough to wake Clint up, by the time they did Barnes would already be awake next to him, shrugging off Clint’s apologies, unless he was caught in a nightmare of his own. But here he was, still and breathing slowly as if nothing had happened.

It was a good thing for him, Clint thought, almost afraid to move in case it’d disturb him. But Clint needed to move, if he couldn’t talk, and eventually he slowly pulled himself to sit up and get off the bed.

When he looked back Barnes was still asleep, but he didn’t want to disturb him by pacing here. The only other option was disturbing Nat, though.

Clint glanced into the main room before committing himself, wondering if he could get outside without bothering her. She was asleep when he first looked, but before he was halfway across the room she waved a hand to catch his eye.

“Didn’t want to wake you,” he said quietly, coming over.

“You can,” she said. “I miss you some nights.”

Clint sat on the settle by her bed and reached for her hand. “Barnes is having a good night,” he said, in half-explanation for his presence.

She glanced at the door to the bedroom. “Good,” she said, sounding as surprised as Clint had been.

“Happens more often lately.” Clint tried not to sound proud—it wasn’t as if he’d had anything to do with it. But Nat smiled at him anyway. “And you?”

“I’m sleeping fine,” Nat said. “But you—”

“Usually I do all right,” Clint said. “Or ... I talk to him about it.” He didn’t have to explain what he meant by _it_ , thank God. Nat squeezed his hand, and she looked pleased more than anything else. “Just,” Clint added, “if he _is_ sleeping tonight...”

“Yeah,” Nat said. “Don’t wake him up.” She moved away from Clint, then patted the bed beside her. Clint smiled and got in next to her.

The next morning Barnes didn’t come out of the bedroom until after Clint was back from the barn, and when he did he looked a little confused. But he didn’t say anything about it, just started breakfast. Clint watched him idly, since normally he was out of the house most of the time Barnes was cooking.

Barnes was mixing pancake batter, with the bowl resting on a damp towel so it didn’t move. “I could carve you a well in the table for that,” Clint offered. Barnes blinked at him and then looked back at what he was doing.

“No,” he said. “We’ve got more than one size of bowl, and this way I don’t have to be in the one spot all the time. But thanks.”

“Right,” Clint said, and started setting the table.

“Nat,” Barnes said while they ate, as he did some days, “I’m going to need a hand around the house.”

“Sure thing.” Nat looked him over appraisingly. “You also need a shave.”

Barnes raised his eyebrows. “Do I?”

“You do.”

“I can shave myself, you know.”

Natasha just smiled, and ate another bite of her pancakes.

While Clint got ready to go out to the fields Nat was heating water and getting out towels, and as he left he heard her say, “You come sit down, Sarge.”

When Clint came back in that evening Barnes was at the stove, as he often was, but this time Clint caught sight of his profile and stopped dead in the doorway.

He’d thought Barnes was good looking, months ago when he first arrived. And then he’d quickly become just Barnes, and half his face was usually hidden by his beard anyway. Now it was shaved off, and his hair was cut short enough to reveal his jawline. His lips pulled up, just a little, at the corner, his eyes were focused before him, and he was probably the most handsome man Clint had ever seen.

Barnes didn’t notice Clint standing in the doorway like an unwelcome guest. Natasha might have, but she didn’t say anything until they were eating, after Clint had gotten over himself and come in and tried to act just as usual.

How did you do this again? How did you make sure that you were neither staring at a man nor avoiding his gaze, speaking just the right amount, saying ordinary things? Clint had known, once, before his marriage, been good at it, even. He’d had to. And then he’d shoved all of that away, except maybe a few times when Nat was in trousers.

“Fine job, if I say so myself,” Natasha said now, nudging Clint. “Isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” said Clint, praying he didn’t sound hoarse.

“It’ll just grow back,” Barnes said, but without the beard you could see that he looked pleased.

*

Two days later they were doing the laundry, Clint and Natasha scrubbing and Barnes fetching water. He’d figured out how to balance two buckets in a yoke over his shoulders, as long as he was careful with his footing. Clint was still trying to relearn how to keep his eyes to himself.

Barnes’ stubble grew back fast, but he’d shaved it again this morning and looked likely to continue with it, and Clint still wasn’t used to catching his gaze on that jawline, or seeing as much emotion in Barnes’ face as he could now. And now that he kept looking at Barnes’ face, his mind wandered to his body as well. He’d thought he was used to it, that Barnes’ good looks were just part of the background of his life now, but apparently they weren’t.

“He looks mighty fine without the beard,” Clint said once Barnes had emptied his buckets and left. He couldn’t help it.

“So would you,” Nat teased. Clint had never had a beard, but he was blond enough that he didn’t bother dealing with his stubble until it started itching.

“What, you going to run off with him if I don’t shave?”

“Clint,” Natasha said seriously, and Clint’s shoulders went up defensively. Joking or not, saying that had been a mistake. “Clint, I—”

“You don’t have to say it,” he said. She frowned at him. “Really.”

Nat glanced down, but then she gave him a sardonic look. “I know you don’t believe anyone’s going to put up with you for long, Clint Barton, but I’m not planning on leaving,” she said, and there was almost, almost enough insolence for it to work, for him to stay calm. Not quite. Not with her having said the whole thing.

“Up to you,” he said, and dropped the shirt he was holding and headed for the door.

“Sometimes I do need to goddamn say it, Clint,” she said to his back, and he knew her voice well enough that there was no chance he wouldn’t understand the words. He stopped, hand on the latch but not sure what he was doing, his head falling against the wood of the door. Her damp hand touched his shoulder, and she spoke almost directly into his ear. “It’s not about you. I don’t need all the freedom you’re trying to convince yourself I do, I just need you to trust that I’ll stay.”

“I—Natasha—” He couldn’t look at her.

“It’s been five years, Clint,” she said.

“Yeah.”

“I’m not leaving. If I ever had to I’d come back. Just as I _came_ back, again and again, during the war.” Clint felt like he was trying to drive his forehead right through the wood. “And Barnes isn’t just staying for my sake, either. I just let him know he was welcome.”

“Ought to see what he’s up to,” said Clint, not moving.

“You do that,” Nat said. “I’ll be here.”

Fuck.

Barnes was coming up with another yoke of water, which meant that he had a clear view when Clint headed for the barn. He’d been hoping Barnes would be further out. Clint turned his face away, waved casually in response to Barnes’ question—he didn’t hear what it was, didn’t want to—and tried not to look like he was running.

He whistled just before he got to the barn and once he was inside Lucky jumped up to him, and Clint went down on his knees and hugged him, shaking. Lucky washed his face for him, which was convenient, and Clint stayed there petting him until he thought he might be fit to be seen.

Well, not really. He wiped his face off on his sleeve. They’d just been rinsing the wash—Nat and Barnes could get by well enough on their own for the rest. Clint looked at the door to his fletching workshop, but no, he didn't want to do anything delicate right now.

“Want to go play fetch, boy?” he asked, and Lucky ran for the barn door, tail wagging wildly.

Clint followed him out and walked as far as he could out into the fields before Lucky started whining and looking back. They were well out of sight of the house by then, and Clint turned back and found a stick. For the first while he closed his eyes before throwing it, not wanting to make any decisions about where it was going. Lucky chased after it anyway.

* * *

Sometimes, ever since she met him, Clint brought her ghosts.

The good ghosts, she told him about. A hand stroking her hair and a woman’s voice calling her _moya Natashenka_ , long ago and with no face attached to the memories. There was little else of her childhood she ever cared to remember.

The bad ghosts she hadn’t told him about, but he’d guessed. He never said anything to stop her when she left his bed in the middle of the night to sleep somewhere else, and he took care not to startle her when she was asleep. He took care during sex, with a consistency that surprised her. He _tried_ , with everything in him. It helped, even if the ghosts still came.

She’d never expected him to bring her such a literal ghost, though. When she’d looked past him and seen Sergeant Barnes in their house, face pale with shock, for once in her life she hadn’t trusted her eyes. She’d thought she must be imagining him, and then he’d called her by name and stepped forward, and she’d seen his missing arm and known that he wasn’t an image called up by her mind, that he’d lived through the past five years just as she had.

Lived _through_ them, but maybe not _lived_ them. Because he wasn’t too different, then, from how he had been more than five years earlier. She’d been so worried for him, when she realized that only chance had stopped him from riding on straight through a blizzard. Because it wasn’t too different from what she’d seen in his eyes sometimes, during the war, before battles. What she’d seen in other faces before his. That utter and honest indifference as to his own survival.

He’d needed someone. And she was so used to people who needed someone. But eventually, and now that they’d met again, he needed _her_. Not any woman, not any redhead, but _her_ , Nate. And in the war, that look in his eyes had been there less, after she’d known him a while. He’d seemed to be getting better. Before Antietam.

After Antietam she’d found Clint. And it wasn’t like that with Clint. Clint didn’t need her to live, not during the war and not now. He’d kept going before her, and he’d keep going without her, if he had to.

But without her, she thought, eventually he’d stop being Clint. He’d become, or he was afraid he’d become, someone else, someone he disliked.

It wasn’t, as far as she could tell, that she’d done anything in particular. Just that she was there with them, and herself. Her actual self, all the disparate pieces of her, not any of the girls she’d been for other men.

As if they could tell by that that she trusted them, and that trust was what helped.

She wouldn’t ever have left Clint alone here, with no one for miles and nothing to stop him from becoming more and more like his own ghosts. But she hadn’t known how to say that, in the face of his obvious disbelief, until Barnes came.


	6. Chapter 6

Barnes’ face stayed pretty clean-shaven after that, and that meant that Clint started noticing Barnes’ expressions more. It was mostly good—he could read Barnes’ lips better too, and, well, it wasn’t like Clint objected to having a stunningly handsome man wandering around the place—but he started feeling like something was ... odd. Not _bad_ , just that Barnes was watching him more, and ... differently.

A month ago he’d have assumed it meant that Barnes and Nat were up to something, but she’d just told him outright that they weren’t, or at least that she wasn’t planning on running off anywhere. And it didn’t really feel quite like that, either. But it did feel like Barnes was more focused on Clint, was maybe feeling guilty about something. Or maybe it was all in Clint’s head.

The weirdest parts were the times when Barnes really didn’t seem to be hiding anything from Clint.

“That was amazing,” Clint said, leaning back in his chair. “How do you cook so well?”

“Learned it when me and Steve were baching it in New York, before the war,” Barnes said, and he’d mentioned Steve before, even in daylight, but this time his tone was light, almost cheerful. “I could teach you.”

“You sure? Better men than you have tried. Or, women, mostly.”

A smile grew across Barnes’ face, and Clint returned it without thinking about it, or why this seemed familiar. “Maybe they weren’t trying hard enough,” Barnes drawled.

“Well,” Clint said. “Harvest is coming up soon, so we’ll be busy, but after that you’re free to have a try.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’m all for it, if you think you can manage him,” Natasha added.

“I’ve managed better and more stubborn men than him,” Barnes said, laughing a little. And then he told a story about Steve back in New York, and Nat told him about the time Clint got into a fight with an oasis. Despite talking about Steve, Barnes was smiling and happy, and Clint grinned at him and pretended to try and shut Nat up.

“She wasn’t there, don’t believe a word she says. She got all this from Red Wolf.” But he couldn’t hide that he was enjoying himself.

He didn’t really think about the pattern and flow of their conversation until he was lying in bed next to Barnes, hours later. The humming in his ears felt worse than usual, keeping him awake, and he tried to distract himself from it. When he thought about that, though, it felt like it reminded him of something ... and that something was picking up men in his days back in the circus, years and years ago.

Of course Barnes and Natasha couldn’t have actually meant what Clint was thinking. But now that he was thinking about that, his dick was awake too.

Clint still didn’t want to wake Barnes up if he didn’t have to. But he didn’t know how much of a disturbance would wake Barnes, whether he could—if he was careful, and stayed really still—no. He knew better—they’d both been soldiers.

They’d both been soldiers. Maybe Barnes would ignore it, the way you did when you were sharing space with a dozen other men. Maybe if Barnes did wake he’d have the decency to pretend he was still asleep.

But there weren’t a dozen other men here—there were just the two of them, and maybe Barnes would reach over and—

Hell, he shouldn’t even be thinking about this. If he wanted it that bad he could just go into the other room and see if Natasha was up for it, and if not he could go jerk off in the barn like he’d been doing for months now, when he absolutely had to. Usually not at night.

If he went to Natasha while thinking about Barnes, she’d know.

Clint rolled onto his side and thought about that weird sore on one of the cows’ feet that kept coming back.

*

The wheat harvest came, and they were all busy for nearly a month. Clint and Nat travelled to all the neighbouring farms to help with their harvests. They always brought some of Barnes’ cooking with them, and Nat was moderately embarrassed by the compliments people kept trying to give her. Clint tried not to snicker; before this year if they’d had to bring something it was usually alcoholic.

Occasionally Barnes would come too, and carry water to the fields and drive ox carts full of grain back to the barns. He did much better now than he had when he first showed up in the spring. Now sometimes he was even social, and he outright smiled over Mrs. Stoica’s plum jam. Clint caught him very seriously bowing over eight year old Cassie Lang’s hand and calling her “Lady Cassandra,” and had to turn around before anyone caught the foolish grin on his own face.

It didn’t stop people talking behind their backs about a one-armed man drawing a salary, but Clint did his best to step on any of that he managed to hear, and knew Nat was doing a lot more.

The harvest meant that they were all exhausted in the evenings after travelling back home, so for a while Clint didn’t need to worry about lying awake at night. Then they had a dozen people over to help with their own harvest.

With guests over, Barnes would be going out to the fields to drive the oxen while Nat stayed at the house, following Barnes’ instructions exactly to cook their meals. When the first few came over—too damn early, in Clint’s opinion, but he didn’t get a vote—Nat slid smoothly into a persona.

“Jane, dear, that looks delicious. Just set it down here. How have you two been doing? Is Rachel looking after the rest of the children?” She went on making cheerful conversation, sweet and talkative and feminine. Barnes gave her some very baffled looks and stayed quiet. Clint followed him when he ducked away to hitch up the oxen.

“I guess since you don’t generally stick around when we have guests, you haven’t really seen Nat playing the good farmwife before,” Clint said, tightening a strap.

“Damn,” Barnes muttered, shaking his head. “She do that with everyone?”

“No, not quite. She’s a little different with different people—there’s a town a while east of here where she’s someone else entirely.” Clint realized Barnes was only looking more confused. “You know she was a spy during the war.”

“Yes, and I know she’s different now than when she was a boy—I mean, when she was playing a boy. But—she just changed how she talks, what she says, everything about herself—why? How?”

“Some of it she does for fun,” Clint said cautiously. “Some of it because it’s easier for us if the neighbours think she’s perfectly ordinary and don’t hear her swear.” Barnes did smile at that. “But when I say she does it for fun—she _can_ do it because she had to do it, I think, when she was a child.”

“Oh,” Barnes murmured, which Clint took to mean that Nat had told him as much as she ever told anyone about the whorehouse she’d grown up in, and Clint didn’t have to.

“She grew up like that, having to act a dozen parts, so she got used to it, I think. Then during the war, of course, she did it deliberately. Now, here, she doesn’t have to do it unless she wants to. So she plays with—” Clint waved a hand. “What people think of her, what she can make people think of her. Her identity. Since she can, you know. And maybe she doesn’t want to get out of practice.”

Barnes nodded. “I guess,” he said slowly. “Like how I’m here—” he patted the side of the ox in front of him “—instead of in the kitchen.”

“Right.” Clint wouldn’t have said it himself, but that was just what he meant, a smaller version of Nat switching between pants and crinolines. “Everyone does something like that, just not usually so much.”

Barnes looked kind of wistful. “Guess so,” he said. “Useful thing to do. Let’s get these boys out there. Get up, haw.” He slapped the ox, and they started lumbering around the barn.

It was just as well—more of their neighbours started arriving, and Clint had to go back in and back up Nat as host, and then lead the men and a few of the women into the fields. After that it was just hours upon hours of cutting and sheaving wheat.

There was some conversation, but Clint lost about half of it to the wind and the rustling of the grain. He knew the neighbours thought he was unsociable, even though they knew about his hearing, but there wasn’t much he could do to change that.

Barnes came around with a bucket of water a couple times, and Clint checked that he didn’t look too strained by the company and grinned at him. Barnes smiled back, then went on to the next row.

When he brought back lunch from the house Clint tilted his head at the space beside him and Barnes settled down next to him with his own lunch. “How’s Nat doing?” Clint asked quietly.

“Pretty good. Mrs. Bryant and Mrs. Drake brought pies, so she don’t have to worry about that, and she’s managing with the roast all right.”

Clint smiled to himself. “And the neighbours?”

“Oh, they’re eating out of her hand.”

Clint grinned, but then he had to join in with the rest of the neighbours’ conversation, as much as he could. And then it was on to an afternoon of more work.

When they had the last load of wheat piled up on the wagon, though, they could all walk back to the house, with the sun lowering behind them.

Then there was the feast the women had been preparing all day. Clint spent most of it watching everyone, since their voices all kind of blended together. If he looked hard enough, he could see when he had to distract a man who was leaning in a little too close to a girl, or send someone over to get more food, or steer Mrs. Drake away from Barnes when she had him cornered and was telling him what a shame it was that he didn’t have a wife to take care of him. It was tiring, even with Nat doing half the work, but at least he had something to do. A few of the people who lived farther away left right after they’d finished eating, but most stayed for more conversation.

Clint didn’t know when Barnes disappeared, just when he noticed it. He didn’t plan to go hunting Barnes down, either—they didn’t need him for anything at the moment, and if the man wanted a moment of quiet he was entitled to it. But when Mitchell asked if he could borrow some of Clint’s fletching glue, Clint went to the barn himself rather than send anyone else. He didn’t _know_ Barnes had gone there, but...

When Clint entered the barn, Lucky stuck his head out from the wagon space at the back behind the stalls. “Hey boy,” Clint said, and beckoned, but Lucky looked at him and then back indecisively. Clint went into his fletching workshop to portion out some glue and wondered if he should go see if Barnes was all right or not. He couldn’t tell from here if Barnes needed someone or would hate to be seen.

When he came back out, though, Barnes had stood up, and he nodded cautiously at Clint over the line of stalls. “Sorry,” he started, and Clint interrupted him.

“No need to be sorry. Stay here as long as you want, don’t worry about it. Nothing that needs doing out there.”

Barnes dusted himself off and came down the aisle. “Really,” Clint said. “Nat and I have to play host, but no one will think it’s odd that you’re here.”

Barnes glanced at the door, then at Clint. “Do you need to go back right away?” he asked, hesitating in the middle of the barn.

Clint blinked at him and then put down the jar of glue. “Nah,” he said, walking towards Barnes. “Nat’s doing most of the work inside, Latham’s helping out, I’m good. Don’t really want to listen to Wilson going on for an hour about how in five years we’ll all be growing corn like him anyway.” He leaned against a stall door and petted Barnes’ horse when she stuck her head out to see if they had anything for her. “They’ll mostly be gone in an hour or so, before it gets dark. I don’t know, some people say days like this make you appreciate your neighbours, but sometimes they just make you remember why you don’t live in town.”

Barnes snorted with laughter. “Depends on the town,” he said after a moment. “Some parts of New York people didn’t really talk to their neighbours. Not where my family lives, though. Half of the neighbours were related to us.”

“You know, if you want to send a letter back there, we can send mail through the general store in town,” Clint said. Barnes looked startled.

“Guess I could,” he said, as if he honestly hadn’t thought of it before.

“We don’t make much use of it, but then Nat and I don’t have much family between us.”

Barnes nodded. He looked at the wall in the direction of the house, then back at Clint. “I’d think you had more than her.”

Clint shrugged. “Don’t know where any of them are anymore,” he said, and it wasn’t—it wasn’t easy to say, he couldn’t just skip over it like he usually tried to, but it wasn’t as hard as he’d thought it might be either. “We keep in touch with a few old soldiers.”

“Yeah?” Bucky looked distant. “That might be nice. Might be able to find some of the Fourteenth.”

“Always thought that if you had enough friends it didn’t matter if you didn’t have much family.”

Barnes looked at Clint for a long moment, and then stepped closer and reached out to grip his shoulder. “Or the right friends,” he said. They stood there for a moment, looking at each other. “With the right friends...” Barnes’ voice got quieter, and Clint cursed his ears, but he was pretty sure Barnes had just trailed off anyway.

Barnes started to look awkward and lift his hand from Clint’s shoulder, and then he jumped a bit and glanced behind Clint. It was just Nat, though, at the barn door.

“Sorry,” she said. “You find the glue?”

“Yeah.” Clint didn’t really want to go back out; he wanted to stay here, with Barnes and Natasha, and just sit down and talk. In the evenings, when they were all tired and maybe still had chores to do, they didn’t talk about much other than the house and the farm. Clint certainly wasn’t about to start a conversation about his past then. But now he wanted to. Though now he was exhausted from a day’s hard work, and his head hurt from trying to make conversation he couldn’t hear half of. Maybe that was why he felt more appreciative of Barnes’ company. Definitely that was why he didn’t want to go back out and talk to the neighbours again.

He had to, though, unless he wanted them thinking he was even odder than they already did, or poking their noses into his things. “I’ll take it out,” he said. “If you’re good here?” Barnes nodded. “I can finish washing the dishes too, if you want a break,” Clint told Nat.

“Tempting,” she said, “but no, I’d better go back out too. If I stop now I won’t want to start again.” She rested a hand on Barnes’ shoulder. “See you later.”


	7. Chapter 7

After the harvest they all had to work together for a week threshing and winnowing the grain, and then Clint loaded up the wagon and took it into town to sell. They still had the vegetable garden to harvest, and next year’s wheat to sow, and then he’d have to figure out if he should be slaughtering anything. He bought two tins of coffee while he was at the general store.

Then he stopped at Miss Ronnie’s and bought shirts for himself and Barnes. “Don’t suppose you’d be willing to do any mending for us?” he asked, as he usually did.

“Pff! No time,” she said, as she always did. She plunked a stack of shirts on the counter. “These fit your man?” Clint looked them over.

“Think so.”

“Next time you ask him if he want only one sleeve, I give you discount.” Clint had to admit that a discount would be nice.

When Clint came back to the house he let his head fall back in pleasure at the smell wafting from the door. When they had been threshing, Barnes hadn’t had much time to cook, but now, men had proposed marriage for less appealing reasons than the smells from the kitchen. He wasn’t sure Barnes would appreciate it if he told him that, though come to think of it he might. Clint unsaddled and rubbed down his horse, gave Lucky some attention, and went to see what exactly it was that smelled that good, bringing the packages from town with him.

They harvested the garden as things ripened, and then dug up the potato field, which Barnes could more or less manage by himself while Clint and Nat went foraging.

This part of Iowa had more trees than the part where Clint had grown up, but nothing like a forest. Still, by the creek there was enough of a thicket to support their traplines in winter, and provide shelter for blackcurrants and berry bushes. There were also a few nut and fruit trees. Clint and Natasha took his bow and her rifle and went out to collect anything they could find, and probably do a bit of hunting along the way.

All of Clint’s good childhood memories involved wandering through the prairie like this. He’d gone out as far from home as he could get every chance he had, usually with Barney. The local Indians had put up with them bothering them with questions, and they’d learnt shooting and hand talk from them, and Clint had always desperately wished that they were the kind of Indians who kidnapped children and made them members of their tribe. They hadn’t, though, and then Barney had inherited the farm and the Indians had moved to Kansas and Clint had been too busy for anything else. He hadn’t had free time to roam around by himself after that until, maybe, the war, which had been very different, and very far away from Iowa.

And that hadn’t been free time; that had been waiting. The war for Clint had mostly been taken up with waiting, either to shoot someone or to be shot at. A little to his surprise, farming had turned out to be exactly the right antidote to that. Farming might be boring, but it was boredom with work to be done, all the time. Useful work, that you could see the results of yourself.

Now, Clint looked up at the oak trees, noting the broken limb he’d taken off for an axe handle last winter, and the one he always wanted to try climbing when he was here but forgot about when he actually had time for it, and the one half-covered by Virginia creeper. The woodpile at home was high enough, he didn’t need to worry about dragging another load back until a while past the first frost. Nat, when he glanced over, was looking at him with an unusual amount of fondness on her face. He looked away, embarrassed, and kept walking. “It’s nice out here,” he said.

“Yes.” Clint had to look back so he’d be able to read her lips, and when he did she signed, _It’s a good piece of land._ Nat stopped by a blackberry bush and popped one into her mouth. _Clint,_ she signed, and he stopped, because she looked serious. _You said you weren’t going to chain me._

 _I meant it._ Was he wrong? Had she meant, a couple weeks ago, that she was fed up with him? Dread settled in his stomach, no matter how little sense it made.

Natasha sighed, and Clint tried not to run away. _Does that still include,_ she asked, watching him carefully, _what I do while I stay here with you?_

Clint thought about it, though it was hard to move past the desire to just say yes so they could stop talking about it. It was easy to ignore what a woman might be doing without you when you were fighting a war and you barely saw her five days a month anyway. And it was easy to say you weren’t going to chain her when the two of you were going off together to a farmhouse a two hour ride from the nearest town. He’d thought that was what he was agreeing to when Nat asked Barnes to stay, but then he’d been trying hard not to think about it at all. Now that she was actually asking, could he really do this, when it was going to be right in front of him?

He was sure Natasha was watching for a reaction, and maybe she already knew what he thought, but he didn’t know it yet. Maybe he should ask her.

 _I think it does,_ he signed, and then he accidentally pictured it, right in front of him like he’d thought, Barnes holding Nat and kissing her, and her responding. “Goddamn.” Though probably she wouldn’t really want him nearby for it.

“Yes?”

“I,” Clint said. “I don’t mind.”

Nat stepped closer and lay a hand on his shoulder. “And if I say I want you to be right there with us for it?”

Clint stared at her, all the possibilities flooding through his mind. _Just watching?_

_No._

She knew. Well, of course she knew.

“I. Natasha.” She stayed close, looking up at him. “You want—You wouldn’t be—”

Sometimes she was nice enough to finish his sentences for him, but now she just looked up into his eyes, and—

He’d always believed in reaching out and taking what you wanted as soon as life gave you the barest opportunity. He’d always thought that was the only way to live. But with Barnes he hadn’t. With Barnes he’d kept his hands to himself, held himself back—well, held back that part of himself.

Because now—now, even if he’d been trying not to think about it, now he had something to lose.

He hadn’t known how Nat felt about that—never asked, never even mentioned it, and she hadn’t ever brought it up. Neither of them believed in God anymore, he knew that. He didn’t know that she ever had. So maybe she wouldn’t call it sinful—maybe she wouldn’t even call it disgusting—but for her to watch—

If she could know that about him, could want to be there and _watch_ him doing—that—and still stay after—

“Yeah,” Clint said. “I want that.” He wanted it so much he could barely get the words out, so much it hurt to say it while she was still looking at him, but signing it would be worse. He almost stepped back with it, but her hand on his shoulder tightened and she stepped in closer.

“I want it too,” she said, and he wrapped his arms around her just as tightly as she held him, as his heart choked him. They stayed there until Clint thought he could manage to look her in the eye again, and then Natasha’s arms relaxed.

“Hickory nuts?” she asked, tilting her head towards a tree.

“Yeah,” Clint said, hoping that was all for the conversation.

But would Barnes want it? Clint worried over it for the next hour. It was hard to think about the idea at all, but he should know, just so he’d know not to get his hopes up.

Nate Rushman, Clint remembered Barnes saying. Remembered him asking about her sex. He’d thought of Nat as a boy, at least for a while, and that hadn’t stopped him from sleeping with her.

Fuck, Clint was almost wishing there was no chance of it, no matter how much he wanted it. But he knew Natasha better than that.

“Have you talked to Barnes?” he asked her under a crabapple tree, looking for windfalls. Nat, who was lighter, was braced a few feet up it. He hoped he didn’t have to explain what he meant.

“I talked to him before I talked to you,” she said, and before he could think about getting annoyed at that she added, “He wants you, Clint.”

“Me?”

Clint tried to fit it together, the beautiful grim man he’d seen slowly opening up wanting _him_ , Clint Barton, but he couldn’t. It was no trouble to imagine Barnes, or anyone, wanting Natasha, and Natasha for her own reasons was happy to stay with Clint, but Clint himself was no prize and never had been—

Nat repeated herself in hand talk, and confirmed, “You. So do I.”

Clint took a deep breath. He nodded, and she didn’t say anything else. He still felt like he was tempting fate, but he didn’t have to duck out on her. He shoved his mind over to thinking about the weather, and after a few minutes Nat said something about how long they could expect before frost.

That evening, with the chores done and the animals seen to and dark coming on, Clint was mending one of Barnes’ shirts, pretending he couldn’t feel the other man’s eyes on him, thinking and trying not to think about Barnes and Natasha in bed together. He wasn’t trying all that hard, though. It was a nice line of thought.

But what exactly was he going to be doing with them? He remembered Barnes’ warm body against him in the mornings. It had been over a decade since he’d done anything like that.

‘That.’ He wasn’t even naming it to himself. Bending over. Cocksucking. Taking the back door. _Sodomy_. He _had_ done it, and there’d been a time in his life when he’d done it a lot.

“Shouldn’t have let you start thinking too hard about it,” Nat said behind him.

Clint opened his mouth to reply, and then realized he didn’t even know how to sass her about this. He glanced helplessly at Barnes, and the look in Barnes’ eyes made his breath catch.

“She says you want it,” Clint blurted out, and then realized he might have to be more specific. But Barnes was blushing beet red, and he nodded. Jesus.

Barnes stood up, looking toward the bedroom door. “I—give me a minute,” he said, but instead of leaving he hesitantly stepped closer to Clint. Clint put down his mending and stood up, and Barnes reached out and lay his hand on Clint’s cheek, large and rough and warm. Clint leaned into it, his eyes fixed on Barnes’ mouth.

Barnes’ tongue flicked out, and then he kissed Clint, gently, just a touch. Clint gave him a kiss in return, with only a little more pressure. “Have you done this before?” Barnes asked.

“Some of it,” said Clint. He hadn’t ever kissed a man the way he’d just kissed Barnes.

Barnes leaned back in and kissed him again, deeper but still soft. Then he pulled away and stepped back. “Give me a minute,” he said again, with more confidence, and then he disappeared into the bedroom.

Clint turned to Natasha, knowing he looked like a besotted fool, but her eyes were bright and widened with lust. They both stepped in, and Clint kissed her, feeling her trying to taste Barnes on his lips. It made him push into the kiss, finding the passion that Barnes had sparked. Her breath caught against his lips.

 _How long do you think—?_ Clint asked when he pulled away, his heart beating fast. Natasha laughed softly, and Clint wanted to kiss her again, so he did.

 _Tidy up in here,_ Natasha signed, and when they’d put everything away and banked the fire she tilted her head toward the bedroom. Clint led her through the door.

Barnes was hesitating by the bed. He looked up as they came in with not nerves but relief. Clint found himself smiling back. Barnes’ shirt was unbuttoned, which was a pretty good reason to smile.

Barnes stepped forward, gaining a bit of swagger as he did. His eyes flickered to the side, where Nat was unbuttoning her dress, but then they landed on Clint again, focused, admiring him openly. “James,” Clint said, a little breathless. He let the name lilt up at the end, like a question.

Barnes’ smirk became shyer, turning into a proper smile, and he said, “Call me Bucky.”

“Bucky,” Clint said, and leaned in without thinking, meeting his lips.

He still kissed slower than Clint expected from men, letting their lips just play with each other, but shortly Clint found he was gasping and pushing himself closer to Bucky’s body. Another pair of hands landed on his shoulders, and then he felt Natasha along his back, and Bucky pulled away from him to kiss her.

“You’re not drowning anymore,” she said, approvingly. She was resting her weight on Clint’s shoulders so she could stand on her toes. Bucky pulled a little against Clint’s hands, but when Clint didn’t release him—didn’t realize in time that that was what he wanted—he stopped, and leaned back in. They kissed again over his shoulder, and Clint just held on to Bucky’s shirt and nuzzled his neck, feeling Natasha’s body right up against him.

Natasha went down off her toes and kissed the back of Clint’s neck, and he groaned and tightened his grip on Bucky’s hips. Bucky’s erection pressed up against Clint’s through their pants, and damn, Clint hadn’t realized how much he’d missed that feeling. Bucky pushed back into it as well, and then Natasha bit Clint, just a little, and under his deeper groan she said, “Bed.”

Clint paused, but so did Bucky, and they looked into each other’s eyes for a moment before following Natasha. Clint pulled off his own shirt, then took his eyes away from Bucky as he undid his belt. When he dropped his pants he felt strangely self conscious, and wanted to cover himself up. But it wasn’t like Barnes wouldn’t have seen most of it at some point or another anyway.

And Bucky, when Clint looked up, was looking more twitchy than Clint felt, of course. Clint didn’t let his eyes linger on his shoulder as he sat on the bed, next to Natasha. There was a lot else to look at, anyway. Bucky joined them, looking a little uncertain.

“I’ve never tried anything with three in a bed before,” Clint said, hoping it would relax Bucky to know he wasn’t the only one. And it did, but then Clint realized something and tried not to look at Natasha, because if _she_ had ... well. The last thing he wanted to do right now was remind her of her past.

Before he could work himself up about it she said, “What have you wanted to do?” which meant it was probably safe to look over at her. “What do you want to do with him?” she asked Clint directly. “I want to watch.”

Clint kissed her first, because he couldn’t not, and then he lay next to Bucky, leaving space on Bucky’s right for Natasha, and kissed him too.

Bucky’s hand came up into his hair as he did, and like before any nerves he might have definitely didn’t stop him from kissing well. Clint reached for his chest, feeling along his right shoulder and the line of his collarbone, then down over his muscles. When the kiss ended he bent over and licked Bucky’s nipple, which got him a hot gasp. He circled his tongue around it and drew it into his mouth and played with it for a bit before leaning up so he could reach the other one.

Sucking on that got him a moan and Bucky’s hand tightening in his hair, which was what he’d wanted. Maybe Bucky couldn’t feel as much on the left side anymore, which was a damn shame. Clint tried to move downwards, but Bucky’s hand held him in place as he started, so he kept his mouth where it was and ran his hands over Bucky’s waist. Bucky’s breathing got harsher. Clint wished he could see how Natasha was reacting to watching this, but if she was making any noises he couldn’t tell.

When his hands reached Bucky’s hips he pulled away and shifted down the bed, and took the opportunity to glance up at Natasha. Her eyes were bright and her mouth open, and the anticipation on her face was everything he couldn’t have imagined before her talk with him that morning.

He looked at Bucky, who was staring at him with desperate hope, as if he was worried Clint would get up and walk away any second now. Clint closed his eyes and bent down to suck in Bucky’s cock.

He hadn’t realized until now that he’d missed this. He wouldn’t have thought it; his memories of cocksucking were mostly hurried and rough. But Bucky moaned loud enough that Clint could hear it, and Clint could feel his muscles, tensed to hold himself still, and he ran his hands down Bucky’s thighs and up their insides, feeling the strength of them, feeling Bucky shake with pleasure from Clint’s mouth. That was all Clint, all his doing.

Something brushed against his hair, and he glanced to the side to see Natasha stretched out, kissing Bucky. Her hand gently stroked the side of Clint’s head. Clint groaned around his mouthful and applied himself to what he was doing.

Bucky finished quickly, thrusting a little into Clint’s mouth as he lost his fierce control over himself. Clint stayed where he was for a little afterwards, making sure Bucky was finished, until Natasha wrapped a hand around his jaw and pulled him off. He followed her pull and found himself nearly being kissed by both of them at the same time. Natasha’s hand ran down his body again and grabbed his cock. Clint groaned into Bucky’s mouth.

“Want you on top of me,” he gasped when his tongue was free. Natasha flipped him onto his back and straddled him. “Christ.”

“Touch him,” Natasha said, and Bucky’s fingers found Clint’s nipple. Natasha rested her hands on either side of Clint’s ribs and rode him, and Clint bent his knees and matched her as his head fell back against the pillow.

Just when Clint was thinking he should maybe do something with his hands, Bucky cupped his cheek and turned his face towards him so they could kiss. Clint grabbed for him, his own arm tangling with Bucky’s and Natasha’s. Bucky sucked on Clint’s tongue and Clint forgot everything but what he was feeling. Natasha squeezed tight around him, moaning, riding him hard, and Clint let go, fingers tightening on the sheets and Bucky’s upper arm. He heard Natasha above him, felt her over him and Bucky holding on to him, lay relaxed underneath them both trying to catch his breath.

They ended up on either side of Clint, Bucky’s arm resting on his chest and Natasha’s arm stretched across him to hold onto Bucky’s shoulder. It was warm and intimate, and Clint wanted to spend all night and all the next day in bed with them.

“Wish it was winter already,” he said absently.

“Huh?” asked Bucky. “Why?”

Clint felt himself blush. “Wouldn’t need to work as hard,” he said. “We’d get, well.”

“More time in bed together,” Natasha said, smirking. “Wouldn’t have to worry about the cold.”

“Well, I guess it will be soon,” Bucky said.


	8. Epilogue

Harvest took as much work as it did every year, but there were three of them to do the work, and Bucky’s cooking at the end of most days. And afterwards, Clint got to fall into bed with two beautiful companions. They weren’t always up for anything more than sleep, but when they were—

It was so uncommonly good that Clint thought he knew why all of it was unlawful. But that had never stopped him before. And with Natasha clearly happy with it, with his own land and no one to judge, he was going to keep hold of it.

When they were just waiting for the first frost before doing the last of the harvest, Nat had one of her spells when she couldn’t stand to sleep near a man. But now Clint didn’t have to sleep alone. He could kiss her good night and watch Bucky do the same, and then go to bed with Bucky warm and solid next to him, occasionally draped over him after they’d worn each other out. It wasn’t the same as having a woman he could wrap himself around, but it was just as good.

With Natasha in bed with them, Clint and Bucky had fewer nightmares. But even without her they now had more weapons against them. This was so far from any other way Clint had shared a bed with anyone that he knew exactly where and when he was if he woke up.

And Clint didn’t want to be anywhere other than in bed with Bucky, riding astride him. It was so much better than he remembered—Bucky had some tricks with tallow that Clint wished he had known about when he was younger.

He leaned forward, and Bucky groaned at the feeling as Clint bent down and kissed him. Clint rubbed himself off against Bucky’s abdomen, slid a hand between them, and Bucky thrust up harder and bit Clint’s lip, a little. That did it—that was—Christ.

“Clint,” Bucky sighed, and he rolled sideways, pulling Clint with him, ending up sprawled over him. Clint didn’t mind at all for now, wrapped up and tangled entirely in Bucky, warm and held, and seeing and feeling nothing but him. They’d probably end up stuck together eventually, but he’d deal with that then.

“Clint,” Bucky whispered, his face pressed against Clint’s neck. His fingers clutched at Clint’s ribs. “Clint.”

Clint wasn’t sure he was up to talking yet, but he leaned his head against Bucky’s. Then Bucky pulled his face away, a little, and looked at him, though surely he couldn’t see much in the darkness.

“Clint,” he said. “I—” He paused, hovering over Clint for a long moment. Then he said, “If it weren’t for you I’d be dead.”

Clint stared up at him. He’d been pretty sure that was what had been going on in Bucky’s head, when he showed up in the spring. He couldn’t deny it. But he couldn’t acknowledge it either, couldn’t just say—

“Nat,” he managed. “Nat too.”

“Yeah,” Bucky said. “But—” He pressed his face against Clint’s shoulder again. “You welcomed me in,” he whispered.

And there was something Clint could say. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Bucky tightened his arm around Clint and Clint held him back, and they stayed like that until Clint started drifting off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to all of you who commented and left kudos; you are all lovely.

**Author's Note:**

> People are putting social media links here apparently? So:
> 
> [Dreamwidth](https://violsva.dreamwidth.org/)  
> [Twitter](http://twitter.com/violsvn)  
> [Tumblr](http://violsva.tumblr.com/)


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